Latest in Ben-Hur

It's been a tough year for that large but elusive box office constituency, the religious believers. The biggest faith-market film to date, TriStar's Miracles From Heaven, did all right, with almost $62 million at the domestic box office; but it far underperformed the same company's Heaven Is For Real, which took in…

MGM reported fiscal Q3 earnings that included a write-down of $47.8 million on its summer tentpole Ben-Hur, which underwhelmed at the box office with an $11M opening weekend in August on its way to a worldwide gross of $94.1 million. Paramount distributed the remake of the iconic original pic that starred Jack Huston…

TUESDAY UPDATE with actuals: With offshore weekend finals in from the studios, Illumination/Universal's The Secret Life Of Pets remained the No. 1 movie at the international box office this session. It dropped a few whiskers from Sunday's estimates, wagging out $43.8M vs the $45M that was projected. That puts the…

FINAL MONDAY WRITETHRU: We’re at that point in August where ticket sales just slow down. Last Friday, there were 58% of schools in session, and this Friday, there will be only 36% of K-12 schools still off for the summer. Where does this leave us? Next weekend will mark the second point since January 22-24 where no…

With an estimated production cost that's in the vicinity of $100M, MGM and Paramount certainly didn't build Ben-Hurto fail this weekend.
But if there's one Come-to-Jesus from this remake’s estimated disastrous $11M opening: It's still a challenge for Hollywood to cross over a faith-based film to the masses 12 years…

EXCLUSIVE: It’s a tough task to re-invent Ben-Hur for the big screen. After all, the 1959 classic is one of the most loved films of all time. But that is exactly what screenwriter Keith Clarke decided to do. After researching subjects for a possible film about both the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the unrest in…

It's here — again! The opening of Ben-Hur tomorrow reflects Hollywood's unstinting determination to plunder its past. Each week carries word of new reboots, remakes and re-imaginings: Splash, Papillon, Jumanji, Top Gun, Ocean’s 8, etc., not to mention all the superhero regurgitations. Why create a new story when you…

I just don’t get why certain filmmakers are drawn to doing big-screen remakes of major Oscar-winning movies that should be untouchable. If you want to remake something, do movies that didn’t work the first time around, like Howard The Duck or Ishtar. But why Ben-Hur, which with 11 Oscars for 1959’s William…

As summer weekend box office grosses begin to ratchet down, it’s clear that kids are heading back to school.
According to ComScore’s school calendar, 58% of K-12 schools will be on break Friday, which is down from the 77% off at the same point in time last weekend. By Friday, Aug. 26, only 36% of K-12 schools will be…

Paramount and MGM have released a third trailer for their remake of the epic Ben-Hur, with the focus squarely on Judah Ben-Hur (Jack Huston) and his adoptive brother Messala (Toby Kebbell), including their showdown in the chariot arena that does look good (and in 3D too) with Timur Bekmambetov directing the action…

At Paramount’s CinemaCon panel tonight, the studio announced that Stephen Frears’ Meryl Streep-Hugh Grant period piece Florence Foster Jenkinswill open on Aug. 12. As a result, MGM co-production Ben-Hur, which was previously set for that date, moves to Aug. 19. That’s good for Par since Aug. 12 is crowded with Disney…

Paramount has dropped the first trailer for Ben-Hur, the remake it's doing with MGM that stars Jack Huston.
The Timur Bekmambetov-helmed pic tells the epic story of Judah Ben-Hur (Huston), a prince falsely accused of treason by his adopted brother Messala (Toby Kebbell), an officer in the Roman army. Stripped of his…